mgo.licio.us

"The face of the operation is Briatore (referred to exclusively in the film by his colleagues and angry, chanting detractors as "Flavio"), an anthropomorphic radish who spends most of his time at QPR plotting to fire all of the managers."

At press time, Harbaugh had sent Michigan’s athletic department an envelope containing a heavily annotated seating chart, a list of the 63,000 seat views he had found unsatisfactory, and a glowing 70-page report on section 25, row 12, seat 9, which he claimed is “exactly what the great sport of football is all about.”

Can you just tell us about the whole process of staying? There was some uncertainty there about what your future was going to be and then talking to Jim…
"Yeah. Whenever there's a changeover the head coach will always hire who he wants to hire and I feel very fortunate to be able to stay at Michigan. You know I love Michigan and I feel very strongly about the players coming back and the guys in this program and I feel very strongly about Coach Harbaugh. I've known that family for a long time. It's just great to be back. That's the thing I'll say."

Were you exploring other options in that interim?
"I had a number of offers. Some in the NFL and things like that, but I made up my mind that if I had the opportunity I'd love to stay and I did, so I stayed."

Talk about this defense. You were excited about it growing last year but obviously this year–
"Well, I'll tell you what. One thing: DJ Durkin is doing a tremendous job, and I think the defensive coaches– It's exciting because you see some of the things we're doing, some of the kids with experience, some of the kids picking it up and it's exciting to see it moving forward. It's exciting to see the kids getting really coached and wanting to get coached and it's good."

Do you have a preference between the defensive line and linebacker, because you've coached both?
"Yeah, I've coached defensive line my whole life. You know, I started out as a D-line coach and I coached the line, oh, I don't know, if you figure– I'd hate to say how many years because that'd give up how many years I've been coaching, but I do know I've coached defensive line probably a lot longer than linebackers and I really like the defensive line. It's a place where I think technique and teaching [are important] and you can get guys to be better. You can make improvements there through technique and hard work so I'm excited to coach the D-line."

There's been a lot of talk of running some 3-4 defense this year, which you haven't done a lot of. Is that different for the defensive linemen?
"You know, we're exploring everything. We did that last year. We ran that last year, but what we're kind of doing on defense [is] trying to see what scheme fits the players we have, so we're pretty broad with what we're doing."

What has your working relationship been like with DJ Durkin and how are you guys kind of feeding off each other?
"Well, Coach Durkin and I are very, very close friends. We coached together a long time ago at Notre Dame. I traveled down there two years ago back to Florida to talk to him about what they were doing and he's done a great job wherever he's been. I've known DJ for a long time and I've always felt that he's a tremendous football coach. Some of the things that he's done at a young age at Florida is remarkable and I knew that, and that's why it's exciting to work with him. It's fun because were not just coaches together, we're friends and that's – I've always liked to be a part of something like that."

[After THE JUMP: Position buzz and 2-gap talk]

Who are some of your pass rushers, and talk about the standup outside linebacker.

"We've had a number of guys get nicked up and guys are really working hard. Our numbers are down on the D-line and they just keep working through it. I'm not going to single out anybody because they're all working extremely hard, and we won't know until into the season who our pass rushers are. I hope every one of them are. I think the one position, if I did single one out, that I'm really, really pleased with is the noseguard position. I think Glasgow and Mone and Hurst are doing a really, really good job. And the other positions are working hard also, I just– that's the group that really seems like they've got a lot of experience."

Is Willie [Henry] playing the nose too?
"No, Willie will be playing tackle and end."

You have a good relationship with these guys on defense already. Have you served as a liaison between the players and the staff?
"No, I haven't needed to do that. I think somebody else asked me that one time. These coaches are so experienced and there's no liaison necessary. I think when the kids are in their meetings and they're being coached by them, players understand right away when a guy who's coaching them is really doing a great job and is really sharp and I think these kids knew right away. I mean, how could you help but not? I talked about DJ and you've got Mike Zordich and Greg Jackson, who played 12 years in the NFL. He coached at the highest level and both of them have coached in the NFL. They are very experienced, very good coaches."

How about from the other end? Have any coaches come to you and said, 'Hey, this guy responds this way' or 'This guy plays real well in this technique'?
"No, it hasn't been– we all speak so freely in our meeting room that if somebody would bring up something about a player and I've seen it before or I haven't seen it before I'll just say that. I kind of have the luxury of having been with them so I'll just say, 'This kid really is a good player, he really is doing a good job,' and I'll say, 'He had signs of showing that before,' that kind of thing. They've done such a good job, in my opinion, knowing what each player's strength is and each player, what he needs to work on so it hasn't been that kind of thing."

You were pretty adamant last season about the experienced youth on this team and that it was coming. You're here this spring now: Have you seen it?
"I have. Yeah, I have. I've seen these kids working hard. I've seen them be a lot more mature. I mean, these practices are tough practices, and if you're a young kid you kind of maybe fold. There's times sometimes where that happens. I've been real pleased with our guys as far as stepping forward and just keep going, keep going. That shows experience."

You talked about coming back to finish what you guys started. Is that the message from you to the guys you're coaching? I mean, you recruited a lot of those guys.
"Yeah, I don't know if it's to finish because when you finish you say it's over. I just wanted to stay a part of what Michigan is and what Michigan will be and what Michigan has been forever and I think that's coming. I just want to be a part of that and I'm fortunate to be a part of it."

You've worked for a lot of different guys at all different levels, including Jim's brother. What's it like working for Jim? What are his unique traits?
"Well, he's just a very, very, very sharp coach. He's really, really intelligent. He's demanding. He's very businesslike. Every day you're going to work to get better. He expects his coaches to work hard. He expects his coaches to do their job. You don't win 49 games in the NFL in three years and not be a great coach. And he's always been that; you don't do what he did at Stanford and not be a great coach. And everywhere he's been he's just done a great job."

There's a lot of guys on the staff with NFL experience, whether it's playing or coaching. How are you seeing details of that applied to this spring practice?
"I think the one thing when there's a lot of experience in a coaching staff [is] you can make adjustments very easy and be able to teach it. Sometimes what happens if you don't have a lot of experience and there's adjustments to be made [is] you have to teach the coaches first and then the coaches have to teach the players but this staff, they have so much experience that they've done that. They say, 'Oh yeah, we've done this. We can get this done' and it's easy to make adjustments that way."

What have you seen from Chris Wormley so far?
"Chris Wormley is working really, really hard. He seems every day to be taking another step toward being the Chris Wormley that we recruited and the Chris Wormley that you were really expecting to see before he had the knee [injury], and I'm really happy with the way he's been working. He's been very physical. He's totally into it. He's been a leader by example. I'm get pleased with what Chris has done."

MGoQuestion: Are there guys on this line that can play two gaps or are you not really looking at 2-gapping this season?
"Well, I think in every defense you have to 2-gap sometimes, so it's nothing different. But it remains to be seen. There's not a lot of people that do play 2-gap."

You've run the show here defensively for the last four seasons. How difficult is that transition to not be-
"Not at all. Not at all. Not at all because, as I said, I really respect the guy I'm working with and the guys I'm working with, and I've done that for so long that sometimes you say it's kind of enjoyable just to take these four guys and see how good they can be. And I knew that when Jim hired me, there's only one coordinator and what he says we do and once you get that you say, 'Okay, my job is to go coordinate the defensive line and to do a great job with that.' And I've done it so long, I've had so many opportunities to do it that it's really just about seeing how good we can get this team."

[Note: Mattison and Greg Jackson’s availability overlapped, so this transcript isn’t complete. I switched over to Jackson’s huddle at this point and missed 1-2 minutes of Mattison.]

The Best Players In Michigan Visit Michigan

While much of the early recruiting focus from the new staff has been on elite prospects in California, Texas, and SEC country, Jim Harbaugh has also made a concerted effort to lock down his home territory. This week, that continues with some of the top in-state prospects making their way through Ann Arbor.

"Great visit today," Corley's father told 247Sports. "Learned a lot from the staff and the legend (Erik) Campbell."

Asked if the visit helped Michigan in his son's eyes, Corley's father responded, "Yes."

Steve Lorenz reports that four-star Cass Tech OG/DT Michael Onwenuwill visit on Saturday ($). Onwenu's been a consistent presence on campus of late to the extent that Michigan has passed Ohio State as the favorite on his Crystal Ball; Onwenu has also mentioned that the Mike Weber situation affected his view of OSU. Three-star Canton OLB Jalen Cochran, who holds an Iowa offer, is also expected to be on campus Saturday.

Three-star Saline dual-threat QB Josh Jackson, son of Fred, was among last weekend's visitors. He told Scout's Allen Trieu that the coaches informed him he's "in the mix" for a potential offer, and they're planning to watch him throw this spring ($). With Harbaugh's preference for taking two quarterbacks per class, Jackson could be one to watch.

3-4, 4-3, etc etc

I've said this before and I'll probably say it again several times before the season starts: Michigan is not likely to be moving to a traditional 3-4 system. Nor will they spend a lot of time implementing a traditional 3-4 to mix in with a 4-3. The time commitment to do so is prohibitive at the college level, and the kind of personnel who can effectively do both are too rare.

Sam Webb:Michigan is telling kids that they are going to be basically 50/50 as far as 3-4, 4-3. As best you can without having a visual aid or a grease board, explain to people, how that will come to pass and why Michigan is saying that, why that makes sense.

Ray describes the 4-3 under as something that could be looked at as a 5-2…

Brennen Beyer, the stand-up SAM in this picture, bounced between SAM and DE for his career

…and says that a 3-4 can look a lot like the under. Both accurate, and as I've mentioned before you can look at the under as a defense halfway between the traditional Miami-style 4-3 even/over and a 3-4.

But I think the distinction here is a bit of a red herring. I asked Spencer Hall what Florida ran last year and he replied it was a 4-3 with a standup end (Dante Fowler); my observations of the Florida defense rarely encounter a nose tackle lined up directly over the center. He's almost always in a gap.

Could it shade to a 3-4? Sure, I guess. Why would they do that? There are two reasons:

To run a 3-4! Obviously.

To disguise their 4-3. Gap-sound unpredictability is a major goal of all defenses. Putting a nose tackle over the center gives him an advantage if he's going to slant one way or the other, but the idea is still the same: get in a gap.

Ray explains:

"If you line up in that A gap or that center believes that they know you have this gap then it is easier for them to block you because you‘re more of a standing target, they know what gap you’re responsible for, but in that 30 front, you can slant and angle in either way. They don’t know which gap you are responsible for and they have to guess and try to figure it out once the ball is snapped, but it gives the D-lineman the flexibility to go either way. And then let the truth be told, in that same 30 front, if you have a noseguard that is lined up right over the center and he slants to the strong side, then that is technically going back to under. If that noseguard slants to the weak side, in the weak side A gap, then that technically puts you in an over front, because the entire front has to shift along with him, so now that gives you some 4-3 flexibility from a 30 front if you just slant and angle, it puts you right into a 4-3 defense.”

If you believe that Ryan Glasgow will hold the nose tackle job, a 30 front featuring him is an undeclared 4-3. Michigan doesn't have a Nix or a Gabe Watson to hold down the middle of that defense and two-gap the center unless Ondre Pipkins goes from afterthought to superstar in his final year or Bryan Mone is terrific as a sophomore.

Michigan may run a bunch of different fronts but at its heart the defense is probably a 4-3. And judging from Florida last year it's not going to seem that much different than Mattison's fronts.

Defensive Line

Lawrence Marshall is a name to watch. [Bryan Fuller]

Anyway this is all a lead-in to an assertion that for now I'm still assuming Michigan has a traditional 4-3 look this fall and I won't be changing up the nomenclature yet.

If and when we get enough data to do so it looks like the first change will be at WDE, which Florida folks sometimes call "drop end." Reports hold that Mario Ojemudia and Lawrence Marshall are frequently in a two point stance—something Marshall had never done and was taking some time adjusting to—this fall. Again, this gives the impression of a 3-4. In my mind it's taking the Mattison 4-3 under a half-step towards a 3-4 but whatever.

Marshall is doing well. His athleticism stands out and he's already about as big as Ojemudia. Ojemudia had to put on a bunch of weight and topped out around 250; unfortunately he hasn't displayed the explosiveness he had in high school at the bulkier number. A platoon is certain… unless Marshall wrests the job away and Ojemudia is again called upon to be a guy who plays spot downs to rest the starter. Michigan is trying out the occasional linebacker there as well, with Royce Jenkins-Stone the most prominent.

The other three spots have seen a ton of rotation, some of it involuntary. Injuries have held out big chunks of the line for a practice or three. When present, Willie Henry has been impressive. Chris Wormley is playing SDE again($), which makes sense given the depth chart (especially with Henry Poggi trying his hand at TE, and double especially if Michigan is moving back to more of an under). 4-3 under SDE is a better fit for him, as he can be that RVB type with a bit more pass rush.

Linebackers

There's as of yet no movement away from the presumed lineup of senior starters: Ross, Morgan, Bolden. With Greg Mattison still around I'm not surprised. 247 does mention a competitor to the presumed starters($):

[Ben] Gedeon has popped out early as a potential contributor in this year's defense. He has potentially the best combination of size, athleticism and intelligence at the position and it might turn into a situation where it's difficult to keep him off the field. For the second straight season, linebacker may be Michigan's deepest position, so if he stays on the field consistently, it will be because he's turned into a good to great player.

True junior Gedeon is a prime member of Team Why U No Redshirt who needs to start making an impact now. Michigan has rotated extensively in the past—not so much last year—and I expect he'll get playing time almost in line with the starters.

That is about all the chatter, with Ross/Bolden/Morgan the presumed starters. They look good when the DL isn't having them catch blocks all day, which has been something of an issue since a lot of guys have been out.

Secondary

There have been plenty of reports on Jabrill Peppers, who is looking like the Jabrill Peppers everyone dreamed about when he committed. Peppers bounces from safety to nickelback and looks like Jabrill Peppers should. He is taking ownership of his unit even as a sophomore:

"He's a high energy, high motor guy and he's going to talk trash," Countess said last week. "And he's going to get everybody going. He's been one of those guys you want on the field.

"Even if he has a bad play, he's going to let you know. And if he has a good play, he's definitely going to let you know."

Countess loves the energy and the intent. But when asked if there is ever a time when he'd like to have the ability to quiet his younger teammate, he's quick with an answer.

No way.

"I love it," he says with a smile. "He says the stuff that I don't say, but everybody's thinking."

As Michigan State demonstrated last year, one of the most important positions on the field as an aggressive defense going up against spread offenses is the slot-side safety. He often gets tested deep in cover four.

It'll be interesting to see how Michigan aligns. I'm guessing Peppers just gets the field side as they rely on the restricted space to help Jarrod Wilson out. An observer from the coaching clinic did note that Peppers is usually "aligning to pass strength," so that is encouraging in terms of keeping Wilson in a FS-ish role he's comfortable with and maximally utilizing Peppers's skills.

Jourdan Lewis is also drawing consistent praise. He was Michigan's #1 corner by midseason last year, passing both Countess and Taylor; it sounds like he has picked up where he left off plus a little bit of tackling strength. With Blake Countess set to be a four-year starter the top four guys in the secondary are pretty set. The main question is: can Countess bounce back from some rough times last year and play man to man? 247 has heard he is in "lockdown" mode, so there's that. I'm reserving judgment.

Freddy Canteen is getting a few reps at CB, so… that's odd. Harbaugh loves flipping guys around to see what they can do, and Canteen is a guy who could theoretically be a good corner. Doubt it sticks, but whatever.

Ace: There's no question this basketball season was a strange one. Michigan headed in with many question marks but high expectations, started off the season with a couple quality wins and a very competitive game against one-seed Villanova, went on to lose head-scratchers against NJIT and EMU before getting run off the court by Arizona, lost their two best players to injury, and then saw flashes of great promise from several players that didn't necessarily show up in the team's final record.

Let's try to make some sense of this. What about this season would you consider a success, what was a failure, and how did it affect your expectations for the program moving forward?

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Failures

Adam Schnepp: I've placed my hands on the keyboard and taken them off three times before I typed this, but not making the NCAA tournament is a failure. I'm hesitant because of the stark negative connotation of the word "failure."

Anything that leads to more Dakich isn't so much "failure" as "awesomesauce with an oh darn." [Fuller]

This is a failure that happened because of course it did. As the hockey guy I'm used to watching the type of failure where you have a team loaded with talent that underperforms and shoots itself in the foot until there's nothing left. Nothing. Not even, like, a bloody remnant that doctors could reconstruct. Just, poof, gone. This is a completely different kind of failure, a failure in which there are explanations (NBA attrition, injuries that led to a lineup Tom Izzo would find weird) that make sense and extend beyond "this is just what we do now."

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Dave Nasternak: Michigan Basketball isn't in the same place that it was seven years ago (one huge mess, but with John Beilein). Its not even in the same place that it was 3 years ago (bummed about a tournament upset but only a round or two away from its ceiling). After seeing the faces of the players and coaches in that hotel in Atlanta two Aprils ago, this program expects to succeed at the highest level. National Championships, Final Fours, Sweet Sixteens, NCAA Tournament games, Big Ten Championships (regular season and tournament) are all accomplishments that this program expects to be competing for every year.

And that's the right answer. As Michigan players/staff/alumni/fans/constituents... that's why we are connected with this University. Now, we don't consistently get the freshmen that Kentucky and Duke get every year, so some of these goals will be a little too lofty from time to time. But I am willing to bet that if you asked people in and around the program if they were supremely disappointed with not obtaining some (most, all) of these goals, they would not only verbally say that they were, but that you would also be able to see it on their faces. That's just what the Michigan Basketball program has achieved.

[after the jump: no more dancing. Around the question I mean. Lots of the other dancing (not That dancing)]

Isaac tried to avoid the no-pads thing last year without success. Future Isaacs won't wonder about immediate eligibility, because the answer will be "nope." [Bryan Fuller]

I must be the only person on earth paying attention to @umichcompliance. This is normally evidence that the rest of you are sane and hearty individuals, but yesterday they posted what looks like relatively big news nobody else has mentioned yet:

Beginning fall 2015, 4-4 undergrad transfers may no longer use a NCAA waiver to be immediately eligible http://t.co/yPrPY4OmzQ

You may remember transfer waivers being a big thing during the Ty Isaac transfer saga. It was thought that Michigan might lose out on him since they were not within the 200-mile radius of Isaac's house the NCAA required for a hardship transfer. He decided on Michigan anyway, applied for his waiver, and was denied.

Why make the change? In recent years more and more players had been trying to get transfer waivers for increasingly dubious reasons. It was getting ridiculous, and threatened to create more of an open market for transfers than there was before. (You may think that's a good idea; the NCAA does not.)

Instead the NCAA will offer a one-year extension of the five year clock* in circumstances that warrant it. IE: if you've already redshirted you can make a hardship transfer without losing a year of competition. This wouldn't have affected Isaac but would remove a barrier to other athletes without the incentive of immediate eligibility.

These will be my general thoughts from the Big Ten Tournament. I’ll delve into the season at-large some other time.

It was apparent for some time that Michigan would be locked into the 8 / 9 game in the Big Ten Tournament, meaning that we knew for weeks that any theoretical BTT run would have to go through a rested Wisconsin team in the Friday noon slot. Unfortunately, the most suboptimal path to the conference semifinal came to fruition: beat Illinois and then beat Wisconsin. Ken Pomeroy’s numbers gave us about a 2% chance of doing that.

For that reason, the Big Ten Tournament was not a disappointment – not by any means. Michigan destroyed Illinois and its feeble NCAA Tournament hopes before acquitting themselves well in a loss against Bo Ryan’s Big Bad Badgers. 1-1 wasn’t enough to get Michigan into the NIT – which was a mild disappointment, if only because we want to see more of this Michigan team. Seriously: after Beilein’s last underachieving squad – the mightily frustrating 2009-2010 Manny / Deshawn team – didn’t get an invite to the NIT, it felt like a mercy kill of sorts. Now, we just wish we could continue to see this team develop and gel.

The Illinois game was a huge reason for this. Exactly a month after squandering a late seven point lead in Champaign to get blown out in overtime, Michigan was awarded a rematch with the Illini and, well, the Wolverines beat their asses. Illinois erased a 14-2 run from Michigan to open the game and eventually took a 19-17 lead, but Michigan went on an extended 27-4 run into the second half to run the Illini right out of the United Center. To be fair, Illinois played a ghastly game, replete with bonehead turnovers and impressively errant shooting, but Michigan played objectively its best game of the season Thursday in Chicago.

Some player bullets from that game:

Aubrey Dawkins tallied an efficient 18 points and was Kenpom’s player of the game; over the Northwestern, Rutgers, and Illinois games near the end of the season, Dawkins combined for 70 points. 70! Even though his shot wasn’t as lethal as it had been against the Illini, he shot 6-7 from inside the arc, including this Glenn Robinsonesque alley-oop from

Zak Irvin, who is truly not-just-a-shooter anymore. He wasn’t all that effective from the field against Illinois, but he tallied a career-high six assists and was an excellent distributor throughout. It wasn’t just a great game passing the ball from a former offensive black hole, it was just a great game passing the ball, period. His shot’s still not right but Zak’s emergence in the pick-and-roll as a complete player was one of Michigan’s biggest storylines moving forward down the stretch.

Spike “Nash” Albrecht, who now is and should be considered legitimately good, hit two big threes and had this wonderful assist to a cutting Dawkins. It was probably Michigan’s best highlight of the year, an artifact of Michigan’s beautiful, high-flying offense from the past few seasons.

Muhammad-Ali Abdur-Rahkman was awesome as well – it was the first game where he and Dawkins combined to play well. Mo put up a line of 15-8-2 and that doesn’t seem like it tells the whole story; he drove the ball with reckless abandon and finished pretty well. It’s not often you see a freshman guard routinely barreling into the chest of a long senior shot-blocker (Nnanna Egwu) with such confidence and scoring tough layups.

Max Bielfeldt threw ten points up on the board. Thanks, Max.

Every time Dawkins made a nice basket cut, or Irvin threw a pin-point pass, or Rahkman challenged Illinois at the rim, I had this little tune ringing through my head:

Michigan was finally evolving and showing its true potential after all that time. Dawkins and Rahkman showed what they were capable of in combining for 33 points (which, when you really think about that, speaks volumes to Beilein’s ability to identify talent in the wake of unexpected NBA departures); Irvin was showing off the type of individual brilliance that will work excellently in a complementary role next season; Ricky Doyle didn’t play much against Illinois but looked great at times against Wisconsin; Kam Chatman even did a few nice things; and Spike Albrecht showed – as he did ever since Walton’s injury – that he’s a very useful college player and not just a quirky little stat from a national title game a few years ago.

After the game, I posted something that gained a ton of traction on Twitter: the scholarship offers of Michigan’s starting five in that Illinois game (which combined for 65 points and routed a pretty solid team)

Albrecht: Appalachian State

Abdur-Rahkman: George Mason, Bucknell, Harvard

Zak Irvin: [was a highly-touted recruit, had plenty of good offers]

Aubrey Dawkins: Dayton, Northeastern, College of Charleston

Max Bielfeldt: Illinois*, Western Michigan, Ball State

*Should be noted that Bielfeldt’s family donates a crapton of money to Illinois’s AD.

Michigan would have these guys, if not for variably expected early entry or injury: Trey Burke, Nik Stauskas, Mitch McGary, Glenn Robinson, Caris LeVert, Derrick Walton. Beilein was left with the lineup above and did as reasonably well as anybody could have expected with it.

Friday night Michigan lost to Wisconsin 71-60 in Chicago, in a basketball game that will likely never be noted for its historical relevance. Wisconsin is one of the best teams in the country, while Michigan might be able to sneak into the NIT, so this outcome was to be expected.

But this was no cakewalk for Wisconsin like it should have been. Michigan had the lead for much of the first half, and the Wolverines tied the game with five minutes left. Eventually, the Badgers' talent won out, but this game was brought up a situation that I've found myself noticing a lot this year: There was no way in hell Michigan should have been in that game.

Spike led the charge with 10 early points (but finished with just ten); Rahkman and Dawkins took a big step back and only combined for 13 points. Still, Zak Irvin played a phenomenal game and carried the Wolverines – 21 points, 11 rebounds, 3 assists and 3 steals against a one-seed is the Zak Irvin we could have only hoped for, even at the beginning of the season before the well-documented sophomore slump. Trahan wrote that Ricky Doyle “out-played Frank Kaminsky for a spell” which seems unfathomable – but correct.

Michigan played Wisconsin even for 35 minutes in Chicago, and though the Badgers’ impressive work on the offensive glass eventually ended the Wolverines’ season, it was still an indicator of positive things to come. This, to me, is the biggest story: over the two games in the Big Ten Tournament, Zak Irvin combined for 35 points, 17 rebounds, 9 assists (to just 4 turnovers) and 4 steals. The light finally came on for him and I’m miffed at the lack of NIT invite, maybe if only because I want to see how much more Zak can do. He faced a ton of criticism this year and, with his performances in Chicago, answered the questions about his game and quieted those asking them.

In addition, Aubrey Dawkins and Muhammad-Ali Abdur-Rahkman showed positive signs of being program cornerstones – a wing and a guard, both capable of becoming solidly above-average Big Ten contributors for multiple seasons. If Dawkins learns to play defense, the sky’s the limit; Rahkman might be forever underrated because of his style – not as many threes, more tough, workmanlike defense. Ricky Doyle was sick for most of the end of the season, but he showed good things against Wisconsin – Michigan’s questions at the center position won’t carry over to next year, I’m thinking.

In the end, this was somewhat of a lost season, but only the true pessimists can’t see some silver linings from the last several games of the season. Michigan’s evolving, slowly but surely, and after some time in the chrysalis, the Wolverines will be back to being Big Ten contenders.